Start Date
12-12-2022 6:05 PM
Description
Indigenous land management practices shaped the environment over thousands of years and promoted ecosystem health while providing for the Native people. The European colonization of North America and the forced assimilation of the Native people largely erased traditional land management practices, resulting in ecological degradation. There is a significant body of research regarding Indigenous land management practices, but there is a gap in examining how historical, social, and environmental events changed Indigenous land management practices, and how this affected the environment. Thus, the creation of a timeline to examine how these events shaped Chumash people’s land management practices from pre-contact to present day is proposed. This timeline would fill this gap in the research, while providing an opportunity for scholars and officials across disciplines to learn from the past to make decisions that benefit Indigenous people and the environment. The knowledge provided by the timeline would offer environmental solutions and highlight Indigenous perspectives. Working closely with the Chumash, the timeline would be created by synthesizing their contemporary perspectives with historical social, political, and environmental context to examine how these factors changed Chumash land management, and the effect this change had on the environment.
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Creating a Timeline of Chumash Land Management
Indigenous land management practices shaped the environment over thousands of years and promoted ecosystem health while providing for the Native people. The European colonization of North America and the forced assimilation of the Native people largely erased traditional land management practices, resulting in ecological degradation. There is a significant body of research regarding Indigenous land management practices, but there is a gap in examining how historical, social, and environmental events changed Indigenous land management practices, and how this affected the environment. Thus, the creation of a timeline to examine how these events shaped Chumash people’s land management practices from pre-contact to present day is proposed. This timeline would fill this gap in the research, while providing an opportunity for scholars and officials across disciplines to learn from the past to make decisions that benefit Indigenous people and the environment. The knowledge provided by the timeline would offer environmental solutions and highlight Indigenous perspectives. Working closely with the Chumash, the timeline would be created by synthesizing their contemporary perspectives with historical social, political, and environmental context to examine how these factors changed Chumash land management, and the effect this change had on the environment.
Comments
Mentor: Rachel Adams, Ph.D.
Environmental Science Program